America's advance GDP figures tend to be more of a bathing suit than a bikini: they are a bit outdated and hide as much as they show. Nevertheless, on January 30th it wasn't just hardened statisticians whose eyes were out on stalks. Fourth-quarter numbers, showing an annualised growth rate of 0.6% (or less than 0.2% in quarterly terms), suggested that America's economy was barely growing at the end of last year. It was lower than economists had expected.

But economists admittedly live in ivory towers. Certain business sectors are dedicated to getting the economy back up - bikini not required:

INTERNET porn barons are advertising in a jobcentre for unemployed women to strip and talk dirty on the web for paying perverts.

The ad - offering wages of £10 an hour - is on show in the jobcentre in Clapham Common Old Town, where job seekers use touch-screen computers to search for work.

It attempts to recruit women to strip off over the internet using webcams that can be set up in their own homes to beam images across the world to clients paying for the privilege....

The job involves women working between 15 and 40 hours a week online and is run by a company based in South Wales called Cybtrader.